When I read the response to the Colorado Education Association (CEA) lawsuit against Senate Bill 191 by former Govs. Bill Owens and Bill Ritter, I was shocked that the CEA would attempt to repeal such a key piece of education reform. I was shocked even more when I found out that the CEA supports SB 191 — they just have an issue with how one section was used by one school district. You wouldn’t know this by reading the response by Owens and Ritter. Their misinterpretation about the CEA lawsuit does nothing to encourage thoughtful debate.

The response barely touches on the real subject of the lawsuit. Instead of arguing the merits of the lawsuit, Owens and Ritter demonized the CEA and promoted the ignorant idea that teachers unions are bad.

Owens and Ritter could have influenced my opinion, but instead they insisted on talking about make-believe arguments instead of the facts.

Scott Pantall, Littleton

This letter was published in the Feb. 9 edition.

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What does it say about gubernatorial candidate Josh Penry if he cannot grasp simple concepts of grants and federal funding vs. state funding?

Penry recently suggested the Governor’s Energy Office was a candidate for elimination to save money, when in fact the office is funded not by Colorado’s general fund but mostly by grants and federal funding. You would think that someone who aspires to become governor would learn how different offices in the state are funded before launching attacks on entities about which he knows nothing. Penry also suggests the office is “filled with political appointees,” which is another false statement and simply proves Penry’s verbal jabs are politically motivated or, worse, made out of ignorance.

What is most surprising, though, is that Penry would ever entertain the notion of closing the Governor’s Energy Office when it’s well known that it was through Gov. Bill Ritter’s efforts and his energy office that thousands of jobs have been created in Colorado’s renewable energy industry, keeping our state from suffering the worst ravages of the recession.

And Penry wants to lead Colorado into the future? Josh, get a clue.

Steve Feld, Greenwood Village

This letter was published in the Nov. 6 edition. For information on how to send a letter to the editor, click here.

Your article about the Western Colorado Congress might have more aptly been headlined “BANANA bunch” for “Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anybody.” Politicians, like Gov. Bill Ritter, are easily caught up in a maelstrom of political correctness by such groups as these. Unfortunately, neither these people nor the politicians they seduce pay for or are accountable for their unintended consequences. Instead their crisis provides them for future opportunities to let others pay for and live with the mistakes.

I agree with your editorial about Metro State College’s performance pay plan, but The Post has missed a much bigger issue on the Auraria campus. The $2 million pay plan is small change compared to the $111 million science building scheduled for groundbreaking on Friday.

Many have seen the signs along Speer Boulevard announcing the new building (and renovations to the existing science building). Unfortunately, Gov. Bill Ritter has proposed slashing funding for the building to $25 million, a cut that could effectively cancel the project. Read more…

Xcel CEO Dick Kelly says that building a 750-kilowatt coal-fired power plant is “the best thing we could have done for both the customers and the environment.” How does this fit in to Gov. Bill Ritter’s promise to bring greater renewable energy development to Colorado? Making a 50-year commitment to a coal plant and the emission of millions of tons of carbon dioxide per year can’t possibly be the “right thing to do.” Read more…

Gov. Bill Ritter took away some important lessons from his visit to the Alberta tar sands nightmare. His remark that adverse impacts from oil shale to Colorado’s water, land, wildlife, air quality, and communities must be thoroughly investigated before commercial development begins is the only responsible position for a politician to take.

What Ritter observed was one of the worst examples of irresponsible energy development in the hemisphere. Canadians are tearing out the heart of the wild boreal forest, the planet’s largest storehouse of climate-regulating carbon, to strip mine deposits of gooey tar sands to meet America’s relentless thirst for fuels. After the Illinois region, Colorado is the largest recipient of oil derived from Canadian tar sands.

And the impacts go well beyond Canada. It takes a huge amount of energy to turn tar sands and oil shale into fuel, making them a far worse source of greenhouse gases than conventional crude.

Colorado can become a leader in creating a cleaner and greener energy future. To do that, we have to prevent industry from filling our fuel needs with the dregs of the fossil-fuel barrel — oil shale, tar sands and coal.

When former Gov. Bill Owens vetoed birth-control information for potential rape cases in emergency rooms around town, it was OK for him to act from conscience formed by his faith.

When Gov. Bill Ritter, who knows a little something about the Catholic social encyclicals tradition of support for labor (Pope Leo’s Rerum Novarum and Pope Pius’ Quadragesimo Anno), acts to bring state workers to the table, The Post panics.

Isn’t it as permissible for one Catholic governor to act on his beliefs as another, especially in an era when corporate dominance in U.S. economics and politics have not given a damn about employees and working people for a generation?

The redistricting gerrymandering that Bob Ewegen writes about was done in the legislature. Nothing that is done in the legislature is secret, as there are too many people involved for secrecy. Not so with Gov. Bill Ritter’s executive order. Only a few individuals were intimately involved, and secrecy was assured. Read more…

Gov. Bill Ritter has continued to find more uses (or abuses) for the executive order – lately opening the door for union representation of state employees, and creating his climate action plan. Read more…

So what is so new about Gov. Bill Ritter’s recognition of a union for state employees? When I worked at the Colorado State Hospital in Pueblo in the 1960s, ’70s and ’80s, many of the employees chose to join the union, which did talk with the administration about matters of mutual concern. Read more…

Guidelines: The Post welcomes letters up to 150 words on topics of general interest. Letters must include full name, home address, day and evening phone numbers, and may be edited for length, grammar and accuracy.

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